One Another
by Synnerxx
Summary: Gabriel switches the Winchesters into each other's bodies. They are not amused and neither is Castiel.


**Warnings: None**

**Spoilers: None**

**Notes: I hand waved a lot of details about the hunt just because I don't write case!fics or mindswap fics and trying to do both in the same fic wasn't working out.**

**Prompt: Mindswap at hc_bingo**

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><p>"Gabriel, I don't think it would be wise to do this to the Winchesters." Castiel frowns in disapproval at the archangel.<p>

Gabriel snickers. "It's just a bit of fun, bro. Not going to hurt them."

"I still don't like this." Castiel turns his attention from his brother to the window of Sam and Dean's motel room. The hunters are down for the night, asleep in their beds, unaware of Gabriel's latest trick. For now anyway.

Gabriel cackles gleefully and then snaps his fingers.

Castiel twitches his wings in irritation, the only sign that Gabriel will pay any attention to. Gabriel looks over at him. "I promise it's not going to hurt them unless they get hurt themselves. Which, knowing the clumsy buffoons, is a distinct possibility."

Castiel opens his mouth to reply, but is interrupted by Gabriel. "Besides, you'll be there to patch things up if anything gets maimed, burned, or cut off."

Castiel doesn't look particularly pleased by that idea, but before he can say anything, Gabriel has flown off and Castiel has no desire to follow his brother.

"Dean, Dean. Wake up." Sam shakes Dean's shoulder hard, voice tinged with desperation and hints of panic.

Dean shoots up in of bed, automatically reaching for his gun when he hears the panic in Sam's voice. Something doesn't sound quite right though, but his little brother needs him. "What's wrong, Sammy?"

He stares at the person in front of him. He's looking at his own face, only that can't be right. There's no mirror right beside his bed. He's staring at a living, breathing double of himself. He looks over at Sam's bed. It's empty, covers and sheets rumpled from someone sleeping in them. "What the fuck?" He turns back to his double.

"Dean. It's me. Sam." His double says.

"What is going on?" Dean demands angrily.

"Go to the bathroom. Look in the mirror." Sam says. It's jarring, looking at him, hearing him speak. He sounds just like Dean himself.

That's when Dean notices it. His voice isn't his voice. It's Sam's voice. He leaps out of bed and promptly falls on his – Sam's? - face. His limbs are way too long and gangly to be his own. He sits up on the floor and leans against the bed, having broken his fall his hands and not smashed his face into the carpet. That would have been unpleasant indeed.

He gets to his feet and heads into the bathroom, avoiding looking at who he really hopes is, in fact, Sam and not some weird double of himself. He turns on the light and braces himself for the face he'll find in the mirror, hoping it's his own. He looks, squeezes his eyes shut tightly and then looks again.

Nope, he's still looking at Sam's face in the mirror. He stalks out of the bathroom to find Sam sitting on the edge of his bed. "Sam?"

"Yeah." Sam answers, looking up at Dean in his body.

This is too freaking weird. He's wearing his brother and his brother is wearing him. He feels too stretched out, made to fill places he isn't supposed to fill, like not enough butter scraped over too much bread. He looks down at himself to find that he's in the t-shirt and boxers that Sam put on for bed last night. Of course he is. This is Sam's body and his mind. Sam's wearing the clothes he wore last night because he's wearing Dean's body.

Dean can be perfectly reasonable and logical about this. Really, he can. "CASTIEL! Get your feathered ass down here right now!" He shouts at the ceiling. Hearing it in Sam's voice is really disconcerting.

Castiel appears an instant later. "Yes, Dean?"

He looks at Dean, who is in Sam's body, and not at Sam, who is in Dean's body. Dean supposes that being an angel, he would know who's who, no matter what body they're in. "What is going on here, Cas? Why am I in Sam's body and why is he in mine?"

Castiel cocks his head at him briefly. "I knew this would not go over well."

"Cas! Just tell us what happened after you switch us back." Dean snaps. It's still weird to hear Sam's voice when he speaks.

"I'm afraid I can't switch you back, as you put it." Castiel says, looking between the two hunters.

"Why not?" Sam asks and if Dean thought it was weird to hear Sam's voice when he spoke, it's even weirder to hear his own voice when Sam speaks.

"Gabriel is the one who switched your minds and bodies. I cannot undo his work." Castiel explains.

"Well, then get him here and make him undo it. I am not made for this gigantic body." Dean growls, looking annoyed. The expression is close to a bitchface, but off somehow.

"Somebody page me?" Gabriel appears with a smirk beside Castiel.

"Fix us!" Sam and Dean shout at him.

"Sorry, no can do, boys." Gabriel smiles innocently.

"Why not?" It's Dean's turn to ask.

"Because I don't feel like it." Gabriel shrugs, looking utterly unconcerned with the fact that their minds are in the wrong bodies.

"Gabriel, this isn't a good time for you to be playing your damn pranks. We're in the middle of a hunt here." Dean says, stepping closer to Gabriel. With Sam's body now his, he can loom over the shorter Archangel. He takes a certain pleasure in looking down at him for once.

Gabriel smirks at him. "Well, I guess you'll just have to figure out how to work your new moose body, won't you, Dean?" He snaps and disappears.

"Damn it." Dean glares at the spot where Gabriel was for a moment.

"Cas, are you sure you can't switch us back?" Sam asks, ignoring his brother's anger.

"No. I cannot undo the work of an Archangel. He has Trickster magic underneath it too." Castiel shakes his head.

"You should have stopped him somehow!" Dean snaps at Castiel.

"He is far more powerful than I am, Dean. I tried to tell him not to do it, but Gabriel doesn't listen to anyone, much less me." Castiel holds his ground against Dean.

"So we just have to wait until Gabriel gets bored and switches us back?" Sam asks.

"Yes." Castiel nods.

"Great." Sam rubs his hands down his face. He feels too cramped in Dean's body, squished down into places that aren't meant for him. There's too little room and too much of him. It's uncomfortable to say the least.

"I'm sorry I can't do more for you." Castiel actually does look regretful, so Dean decides to lay off for now.

He disappears with the sound of wings fluttering, leaving Sam and Dean alone in their room.

"Call Bobby." Dean says finally after they sit in silence for a few minutes, caught up in their own thoughts and trying to get over the strangeness.

"Why? What can he do? We know who did this to us and, until Gabriel decides to turn us back, there's nothing to do. We need to finish the hunt." Sam says reasonably.

"Fine, whatever." Dean really isn't in the mood to argue with his brother.

The research part is easy. There's no one that they have to fool by pretending to be each other, so they don't bother with that. Sam searches online, finds info about the house that's apparently being haunted. Turns out, the family who had the house before had a daughter who committed suicide.

"It's likely her angry spirit haunting the place. Just a routine salt and burn." Sam says, clicking through some obituaries.

"Okay. Does it say where she's buried?" Dean asks, loading a shotgun with rocksalt.

"Yeah, over at Our Lady Of Peace cemetery." Sam answers, shutting the laptop.

It should have been simple. Just a normal, routine salt n' burn, but being that they aren't used to the bodies they are in, mistakes happen. Mistakes that shouldn't have happened.

They're back in the motel, Sam stitching up Dean's arm (which is actually his and he's not looking forward to the nasty cut Dean got from a knife thrown at him by the spirit.) when Castiel appears with Gabriel.

"Change them back." Castiel says sternly, looking as irritable as he gets.

"Aww, come on, bro! You gotta admit, it's hilarious to see them fumbling around more than usual." Gabriel smirks at them.

Castiel heals the wound on Dean's arm and then faces Gabriel. "You know what happened today. We can't afford for mistakes like that to continue happening when we're up against the armies of Heaven and Hell, Gabriel. Archangel or no, you can't take them all on by yourself, contrary to what you'd have us believe. We need their help."

There's a flash of anger in Gabriel's eyes, quick and frighteningly bright, but it disappears back under the mask as soon as it appears. "Fine."

A burst of light and the Winchesters are left blinking, back in their own bodies once more. Gabriel isn't anywhere to be found. Castiel looks at them intently. "Are you okay now?"

"Yeah." They say in unison.

They stretch their own limbs out, feeling the difference. Sam doesn't feel smushed down and cramped. Dean doesn't feel stretched out and too thin.

"It is good to be home." Dean declares with a grin.

"Oh yeah." Sam grins back.

Castiel nods and disappears as well with a flutter of wings.

Everything is back to normal. Well, as normal as life is for the Winchesters.


End file.
